1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a terminal that holds a tab of a mating terminal between a leaf spring portion and a tab clamping projection wall for electrical connection.
2. Related Art
Such a conventional terminal is disclosed in JP 2001-210417 A. As shown in FIGS. 5A and 5B, a female terminal 50 includes a terminal connection part 51 for connecting a male terminal 70 and a wire connection part (not shown) for connecting a wire. The terminal connection part 51 includes a box portion 52 having a terminal insertion chamber 52a into which a tab 71 of the male terminal 70 is inserted and a leaf spring portion 53 that extends from a front end of the box portion 52 and is turned back into the terminal insertion chamber 52a, and a tab clamping projection wall 54 that is formed by extruding a part of the box portion 52 and is arranged spaced apart from the leaf spring portion 53.
The leaf spring portion 53 is provided with a spring side projection 53a protruding toward the tab clamping projection wall 54. The tab clamping projection wall 54 is formed in a curved shape that is spaced from the tab 71 at the position of the spring side projection 53a and is close to the tab 71 at the front and rear positions in a tab insertion direction e relative to the spring side projection 53a. Such a curved shape provides the tab clamping projection wall 54 with portions that are most prominent at the front and rear positions in the tab insertion direction e relative to the position of the spring side projection 53a, that is, a pair of projections 54a. 
When the tab 71 of the male terminal 70 is inserted into the terminal insertion chamber 52a of the female terminal 50, the tab 71 makes contact with the leaf spring portion 53 and the leaf spring portion 53 is deflected by being pressed. This allows the tab 71 to be further inserted into the terminal insertion chamber 52a, and the terminals are engaged as shown in FIG. 5A. The tab 71 makes contact at three points including the spring side projection 53a of the leaf spring portion 53 and the pair of projections 54a, with an elastic restoring force of the leaf spring portion 53 as a contact load.
The female terminal 50, in which the tab 71 of the male terminal 70 makes contact at three points, provides a stable and vibration-resistant contact.
In the conventional example described above, however, the tab 71 is inserted while sliding on the tab clamping projection wall 54 upon insertion of the tab 71 of the male terminal 70, and a sliding width d2 is wide enough and close to a width d of the tab clamping projection wall 54 as shown in FIG. 5C. Therefore it is problematic that a terminal insertion force needs to be large due to a large sliding area of the tab 71.